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1968 Gibson Dove: Logo Repair

This amazing old Gibson Dove dates back to 1968. It’s a clean guitar with few bumps and knocks; it’s amazing to see a guitar of this age without any splits or cracks.

However, there is one nagging issue and that’s with its logo, half of it is missing!

It was made in the days when Gibson, in their wisdom, inlayed a M.O.P. plate into the headstock, attached the logo stencils and spray-painted the negative space. After many decades the paint has begun to flake off. I wonder how many more of these from that era are out there with similar peeling logos.

The remedy is quite straightforward. A logo stencil will need to be created. Care must be taken in masking off the area around the stencil because of the fragile finish.

A positive logo is made up and attached. The remainder on the head is masked-off

Numerous coats of nitrocellulose lacquer must be applied to build a suitable thickness

This is the result after many layers

The new logo is carefully cleaned-up and cut-back
The logo and headstock is treated to several coats of shellac to seal, protect and help with the aging effect.

I have recently acquired a 68′ dove. Beautiful guitar, in extremely prestine condition, although i have one problem with it.. BUZZING, how do you think i should go about to fix this problem? i dont really want to play around with the action at all really, its perfect where it is, i was thinking maybe changing the nut and somehow play around with the bridge (tune-o-matic) but im not too farmiliar with that bridge. Any suggestions ? please e-mail me back at your earliest opportunity.

Hi Juien,
The first thing to check would be the frets. Check for any high frets and deal with them accordingly. Once any fret height or wear issues have been eliminated this will give a good bases to set the playing action. Truss-rod and saddle height should be balanced accordingly.
Replacing the nut will do nothing unless the rattling issue is on the open strings. If the rattle is on the open strings it will suggest that the strings are rattling on the first fret. This can be easily resolved with a simple truss-rod adjustment. I would suggest that you should take this guitar to your local Luthier or Guitar Tech to have any adjustments made.
Good luck,
Graham